Mark Frauenfelder: The New York Times reports that tow truck companies in Los Angeles are out of control, towing cars illegally and then charging exorbitant fees before owners can get them back.

In one case here, a church's pickup was towed from its own parking lot; in another, a 4-year-old boy was towed away in his mother's car after she went inside her apartment for a few minutes to drop off groceries and a younger child.

And a man who ran alongside a tow truck, pleading to get his vehicle back after it was towed from a fire lane, died when he slipped and was run over by the truck and then his own Chevrolet Suburban.

href="http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&safe=off&c2coff=1&domains=boingboing.net&q=tow+truck&btnG=Search&sitesearch=boingboing.net">Previous Boing Boing coverage of criminal tow truck drivers)

Music Thing has a wonderful entry up with links on making a working paper pipe organ including this link about pneumatic drives and paper machines....

As you probably know, the stuff that people auction on eBay can sometimes be awfully weird. Now an intrepid coder has produced a program that calculates precisely how weird an individual auction is. He calls is "The eBay Strangeness...

Cory Doctorow: A Vegas developer is creating a 44-acre East-Village-themed shopping center:

...Las Vegas developer Mark Advent's "East Village" retail complex plan, complete with faux Washington Square and an entertainment zone called the "Meat Packing District." But ever since stumbling across this ultimate show of hubris we've been hungering for more. Other than calling it the East Village, what will make the 44-acre commercial playground identifiable as such (CBGB hasn't packed up for there, yet)? Well, if this promotional electronic pamphlet is to be believed, it's a Ray's Pizza, a traffic cop, a hot dog cart and some roadside banners.

(via Kottke)

Building in Iceland? Better Clear It With the Elves First

"[A] port on the outskirts of Reykjavik prides itself on its unusually high elf population. Tourists are invited to tour the known elf locations, including a large rock whose reputation as an elf habitat meant that a nearby road was diverted some years ago so as not to disturb its unseen residents. Recently, the planning committee considered a resident's application to build a garage. "One member said, 'I hope it's O.K. with the elves,'" Ms. Erlingsdottir related. Should the council determine that it is, in fact, not O.K. - usually this happens when a local mystic hears from the elf population, directly or through a vision - the town would consider moving the project, or getting the mystic to ask the elves to move away, she said.

Such occurrences are not unusual... Read more

Photos and editorial on the Bike Messenger World Championships

This is for our good buddy Ben Stewart --MK

It was a matter of time before this became official. Australia, notorious for its strict policies on movies and games (they’ve kind of used Crocodile Dundee as a ratings standard - just kidding), has finally banned Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas from the country. Australian had been doing its own investigation into the Hot Coffee matter, and now the Attorney-General has decreed that GTA would exceed its MA15+ (Mature, for 15 years and up) rating, and since that’s the limit the game is therefore barred from being sold anywhere in the land down under.

I'm not a violent or bad person and I really enjoy playing Grand Theft Auto. I enjoy San Andreas missions a lot more than Vice City and I never go on rampages except for when my driving goes out of control. --MK

The Iranian government will censor magazines from the US and Europe by physically blacking things out -- even models' skin. In this spread from Marie Claire, for example, Iranian censors turned black dresses into burkas.

Adding burkas to pictures could be a fun job --MK

A modest patch of water ice is found in a rare location.

Even though this is from ESA and not our beloved Rover, doesn't mean we can't appreciate it.

The Perseid meteor shower peaks next month, but already its forerunners are darting through our night sky. And there are a host of minor showers in summertime that make meteor watching rewarding on just about any clear night under dark skies. read more...

not that I ever remember to watch these things --MK

Strange flash game

The Asylum: Psychiatric Clinic for Abused Cuddly Toys

(Thanks Steve!)

Part of Daniel Rozin's Software Mirrors series (when a viewer stands in front of a mirror, their image is reflected on the screen after it has been interpreted by the computer.), Hourglass Mirror examines notions of time, scanning, motion and stagnation.

The image of the viewer is created by the movement of the grains of sand in the upper part of the hourglass, in the lower part of the hourglass a representative color of the viewer is settled to create a sediment that keeps building up creating a history of a few minutes worth of viewers.

Movie.

Check also his other mirrors. Inspired by MAKE.

Robotclothes loves Danny Rozin. --MK

My kitties need this. It would look better than our real furniture. --MK

I don't know anything about Mormons, but I'm always interested in Mormon news. My favorite football coach is a mormon. --MK

tatoos

Personally, I don't get tattoos. It is the only part of my religion that stuck with me. But I did marry someone who got a tattoo on his hand for a grad school project. -MK

Head on over to the Comic House for more Dutch illustrators, cartoonists, and animators than you can shake a tulip at. This place is a goldmine.

I can't understand the words, but the illustrations look cool --MK

Have you ever found a bug in the house or garden but didn't know what kind it was? Take a picture of it and send it to this site. Plenty of creepy crawly pics for you to browse. Link

Perfect for most apartment dwellers in NYC --MK

Sexual double entendres were removed overnight from Burger King's new website, CoqRoq.com, but the company claims it has received no complaints from consumers or other outside groups, AdAge reports. The deleted content included captions, under photos of young girls, that read: "Groupies love the Coq" and "groupies love Coq."

The captions were there when the site went live yesterday, but according to Edna Johnson, SVP for global communications for Burger King, malfunctions in the Flash and XML programming were responsible for putting the captions up. A misspelling of "Burger King" had also been fixed, she said.

The site, created by Crispin Porter & Bogusky of Subservient Chicken fame, is designed to look like a rock band site. (The band is named CoqRoq, the lead singer Fowl Mouth.) (MEDIABUYERPLANNER)

Creative Commons made an appearance of sorts in the free software in-joke comic Everybody loves Eric Raymond.

As it happens the strip is CC-licensed. That makes at least two.

Thanks to Will for the pointer.

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-5793685.html

Former Bush official to get RFID tag By Michael Kanellos, CNET News.com Published on ZDNet News:?July 18, 2005, 4:43 PM PT

Tommy Thompson, the Health and Human Services Secretary in President Bush's first term and a former Governor of Wisconsin, is going to get tagged.

Thompson has joined the board of Applied Digital, which owns VeriChip, the company that specializes in subcutaneous RFID tags for humans and pets. To help promote the concepts behind the technology, Thompson himself will get an RFID tag implanted under his skin.

Human RFID tags have emerged as one of the more controversial technologies in years. Civil libertarians theorize that the chips will allow governments or corporations to track people's movement and behavior. Some Christians have said the chips are so evil they fulfill a biblical prophesy about satanic influences.

Advocates, on the other hand, say the chips will contain personal information that will help medical professionals and others provide emergency treatment. The chip provides a form of identification that's tough to lose. By clicking the number found on the chip into a password-restricted database, paramedics can get an accident victim's medical history in the field. (One of VeriChip's scientists came up with the idea of using the company's pet RFID tags on people after watching rescue workers struggle to find the missing after the Sept. 11 tragedy.)

Tuesday, August 2: The Berkman Center for Internet & Society will host a public showing of "Blogumentary," an independent documentary directed by Chuck Olsen about blogs and their influence.  Blogumentary is 70 minutes long, and will begin showing at 7pm in Pound, room #102 on Harvard Law School's campus. Olsen will introduce the screening and will answer questions afterward.

About Blogumentary from Chuck Olsen: Blogumentary explores the many ways blogs are affecting our media and politics. Personal political writing is the foundation of our democracy, but mass media has made us into passive consumers instead of active citizens. Blogs return us to our roots and reengage us in democracy.

For more information, visit Blogumentary's homepage: http://blogumentary.org/
For more information on Chuck Olsen, visit his bio: http://blogumentary.typepad.com/about.html

Rosey Grier was a 6′ 5″ 300 pound NFL player in the 1970s whose favorite hobbie was needlepoint… and he wasn’t afraid to admit it! He even wrote a book entitled “Rosey Grier’s Needlepoint for Men.” Someone out there with a copy of this book was nice enough to scan some pages into Flickr and you can see them all here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/69799427@N00/sets/491625/

Ahhh. Makes my heart swell!

Just like Rosey Grier, I love crafting and I love the NFL! --MK

Betsy Ross, Aimee Dolby's line of chic user-friendly clothing patterns, is one of the most recent additions to the growing DIY institution. Thanks to O.G.s like ReadyMade magazine (I'm a regular contributor), new kid Make, and the Renegade Craft Fair, modern crafty products like Dolby's have an established market. Her stylish kits, which include two skirts, a blouse, a dress, pants, and a tote, all come with a detailed instruction booklet, a bookmark featuring a glossary and technique, and a sturdy well-designed pattern (so crisp-looking it could double as wrapping paper) that can be easily sized to fit. Betsy Ross' thorough guides take the intimidation-factor out of sewing and, thanks to Dolby's sweetly charming sense of humor, even make it fun. Look out for a circle skirt, another blouse, and a fall coat in the near future.

pretty decent review of the book, and praise for my chapter!

Way to go Frumin --MK

Kaki and I are off to LA where we will both be speaking on panels at SIGGRAPH. My panel is on August 4 and is called “How is the Web Growing? Into a Social Super-Organism or a Mass of Disconnected Information?” Should be a fun panel with some interesting speakers all discussing our views on the “tangled web". Kaki’s panel is on August 3 and is called Extreme Fashion: Designers, Artists, and Technologists Present a Glimpse Into the Place Where High Fashion Collides With High Technology. Should be fun! Plus we will be running one of our Scrapyard Challengeworkshops there - this time it will be the “DIY Wearable Challenge” in conjunction with the SIGGRAPH Fashion Show which will be fun. So please stop by if you are in the area! I’ll be blogging from the conf and will do a proper write-up of it afterwards.

These should be some interesting events, if anyone is heading to Siggraph. Wish I could go to the DIY Wearable Challenge. --MK

Rubbish Drawings

I walked the streets one day and as I looked around my mind started to change and an idea was created. From this day on I would see rubbish differently.... You can take a horse to water but can you take to it into an exhibition? Well now you don't have to worry, just let it wonder down the road and look at my Rubbish Drawings.

I would love to see my landlord Joe yelling at someone for drawing on the trash. He hates when people mess with his trash. --MK

Julian Beever is an English artist who is famous for his art on the pavements of England, France, Germany, USA, Australia and Belgium. It's peculiarity? Beever gives his drawings an anamorphosis view, his images are drawn in such a way which gives them three dimensionality when viewing from the correct angle. It's amazing !!! Link

What we like most about this artist is how much his art makes him smile and squat --MK & JP

not so simple now, even for white guys, but maybe it never was

UPDATE: I received a very constructive comment on my last post, "bag the entrance searches, we need exits!", from Matt of the "Flex your Rights Foundation," and I thought it would be extremely useful as a post of its own.

Go here for The Citizen's Guide to Refusing New York Subway Searches. The site includes an excellent introduction to its practical advice on how to "safely and intelligently 'flex' your rights":

In response to the recent London terror attacks, New York police officers are now conducting random searches of bags and packages brought into the subway.

ights takes no position on the usefulness of these searches for preventing future attacks, we have serious concerns that this unprecedented territorial expansion of police search powers is doing grave damage to people's understanding of their Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.

In addition, as innocent citizens become increasingly accustomed to being searched by the police, politicians and police agencies are empowered to further expand the number of places where all are considered guilty until proven innocent.

Fortunately, this trend is neither inevitable nor irreversible. In fact, the high-profile public nature of these random subway searches provides freedom-loving citizens with easy and low-risk opportunities to "flex" their Fourth Amendment rights by refusing to be searched.

[image of Norman Rockwell's 1958 "The Runaway" from the artchive]

I've been trying to decide how to react to a request to search my bag since I disagree with the random searches. Maybe this will help. -MK

Xeni Jardin: English translation of a controversial, internet-propagated map that lists places and methods for bumping yourself off in Shanghai.

— hanging yourself is simple among the tall, close trees.
# Wang’s Tofu Stand — crush yourself with a piece of tofu.

Link (Thanks, Joe)

Remember our giant piece of Scotch Tape holding Canada together? Well our ever-helpful readers have since turned up several more pieces of this gargantuan sticky-tape…

read more...

Toyota is planning more prominent emblems on its gas-electric hybrid SUVs in a new belief that owners want others to know of their environmental consciousness. Hybrids save gas and reduce air emissions compared with conventional gasoline-powered cars and trucks.

Toyota's first hybrid was Prius, a distinctive car that has no conventional-powered twin. Now Toyota is selling hybrid versions of Toyota Highlander and Lexus RX330 SUVs, both of which also are available as gas-powered models. The Lexus is called the 400h.

Research while the vehicles were being developed showed that potential customers didn't want to stick out just because they were driving a hybrid, Lexus spokesman Bill Ussery says. (USA TODAY)

Interestingly enough, I read the other day in the NY Times that more recent hybrid vehicles are not more fuel efficient, but use the hybrid engine for better performance. So, now you can announce that you have a hybrid car without any of the down-side of a hybrid car. -MK

Maybe it's because young computer gurus are now enjoying the millionaire life. Perhaps it has something to do with the unexpected popularity last year of the movie Napoleon Dynamite, about a quirky, dancing teen and his sleepy Idaho town.

Whatever the reason, being a nerd, a geek, a dork - whatever you want to call the tragically unhip - is becoming a source of pride. Case in point: Steffi Weiss, a 15-year-old in the Chicago suburb of Lake Zurich, who plays violin in the school's orchestra.... (ASSOCIATED PRESS)Read More

Just as a follow-up to yesterday... hipsters are definitely out and dorks are definitely in. I'm glad someone is codifying this for me. -MK

CAPE CANAVERAL - The space shuttle Discovery roared into space Tuesday, piercing a Florida morning sky today and launching seven astronauts on NASA's first orbiter mission since the Columbia disaster.

Visit Space.com for full coverage of today's shuttle launch. The launch is scheduled for 10:39 AM EDT. Full Launch Coverage

We like space missions. Launches get rescheduled a lot, which is good to know if you ever schedule a vacation around a mission launch. We were so close... -MK

Reuters - An Italian couple stole 50,000 euros from a woman in the Sicilian city of Palermo after convincing her they were vampires who would impregnate her with the son of the Anti-Christ if she did not pay them.

(image from Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992)

I read the Odd News every day and there is always a vampire story from a particular country in Africa. This is the first story I have seen about vampires in Italy so the vampire crisis may be spreading. -MK

The Potato Powered Web Server experiment is now done, but it was the worlds lowest power web server. This is a nice reminder that even when there’s a blackout you can still serve websites. Just have to be careful that the power unit isnt too close to a deep fryer or an over anxious McDonalds employee…

The potatoes look nicer than a surge protector, but give those potatoes a few weeks in a New York city apartment... - MK

For Melinda Wilferd, nightlife in Los Angeles was a lot like high school. The 35-year-old ran with a crowd that often went to parties in downtown lofts, "where all the faces turn around and look at you, assessing whether or not you're going to fit in the hipster club." Where if you enjoy watching TV, you're held beneath contempt. And where "they talk about music like it's some revelation."

The pretension and callowness finally got to her, and one night "I told my friends I can't do this anymore." She began exploring wine bars and jazz clubs in search of more fulfilling nightlife -- and to get away from hipsters. "Now I'm more interested in what pleases me," says the employee of a major cable network. "I just want my little place in this mad, mad world."

For many twenty-, thirty- and fortysomethings, the appeal of being cool and edgy is rapidly deteriorating. "The last identity you would want to claim now is a hipster," says John Leland, author of Hip: The History. "It's the worst of insults." (ORLANDO SENTINEL)

Is unhipster the new hipster? -MK

It's Quite Natural...

"Researchers are working on "information rain", taking advertisements to the realm of mock meteorology. A projector on a tall tripod shows images of raindrops hitting the ground and making ripples, in hopes that people will enter the "rainy" area and hold out their palms.

A camera tracks the entrants' movements and sends the data to connected computers. Then the projector shoots out a round-shaped advertisement -- which can post words such as "SALE" -- right onto their hands. NTT Cyber Solution Laboratories, run by telecom giant Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) in the port city of Yokosuka south of Tokyo, believes the "rain" can be a perfect draw for customers.

"It's quite natural that you hold out your palm when it starts raining," said Yoko Ishii, a chief researcher in the human interaction project." Continue >> [via]

This week's Vitamin_F mix was put together by Maya Hayuk in New York. If you're not yet familiar with the Vitamin_F Podcast series, every Friday we put up an exclusive mix of music from a different artist from the Wooster Collective website. The Vitamin_F series is curated by Vinnie Ray





Vitamin_f Podcast #12: Maya Hayuk "Summer of Love Battles" Mix
Length: 1 hour 14 min 47 seconds


1 x ray specs-Germfree Adolescents
2 julie ruin-Breakout a Town
3 Back In The New York Groove
4 brian eno-passage of time
5 damned-Dozen Girls
6 dre. dre-surgery
7 revolutionary control committee-rebel without a pause
8 track 8-aldo nova-juice newton (maya's mash-up)-fantasy
9 freak nasty - da dip
10 gary numan-Cars ('E' Reg Extended Model)
11 gun club-She's like Heroin to me
12 langley school project-Mandy
13 led zep-Down By The Seaside
14 mellow candle-Lonely Man
15 nanette natal-annies magical brew.
16 olivia tremor control-California Demise
17 os brazoes-tao longe de mim
18 poppy family-evil grows
19 sammy johns- chevy van
20 sniff & the bears-drivers seat
21 Welcome Back

We’re a little wary of Inside Bay Area’s decidedly alarmist article titled “Hackers prey on unguarded wireless links,” which goes the distance in furthering the meme propagating that hijacked WiFi = super duper bad and teh ev1l hax0rs will come to get j00. But what’s more egregious are the claims made by Lt. Bob Lozito of the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Department’s Hi-Tech Crimes Task Force, who says that cantennas (WiFi antennas made of Pringles cans or like shapes) are “unsophisticated but reliable, and it’s illegal to possess them.” This, apparently, because a student caught trying to hack his grades at school posessed a cantenna. Uh, we’re not entirely sure whether or not Mr. Lozito’s quoting the law or making it up as he goes (we’ll tell you what we think he’s doing), but seriously, is the government going to start making pickup trucks illegal because they can be used to loot houses whose doors are left unlocked?

[Via TechDirt]

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SEATTLE (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp. , the world's largest software maker, said on Friday it will call the next version of its operating system "Windows Vista" as it prepares to release a wave of new products after posting its slowest-ever year of growth.

Awesome. this is what citizen media is about

"Lux Mean works for the IRI.  He is currently training young people in Cambodia's provincial areas how to blog.  His organization is excited about the potential for Cambodian blogs to generate more political dialogue.  Mean was only recently introduced to blogs and the organization got the idea of doing a blog projects from one of Cambodia's better known bloggers, Ex-King Sihanouk."

Only 5 per cent of American movies made over the last five years have come from spec scripts … and only an additional 3 per cent have come from pitches, observes Derek Haas. He offers this analysis: These statistics strongly imply that over 95 per cent of the movies made in the last five years are written by someone who is already a professional. A “spec script” is Hollywood argot for a script which is written without an assignment from a producer, on the “speculation” that it would sell. [The Blank Page] [Pie chart by Cinema Minima staff]

• Shop the Writers Store for screenwriters’ supplies, books, courses, and software — even those little brass fasteners for your script (tip: in Hollywood, writers only use two fasteners — never three). Your purchase through this link supports Cinema Minima

• Download Movie Magic Screenwriter from the Writers Store Now — for only US$199.95

Apparently in response to Google Earth, Microsoft has launched MSN Virtual Earth. According to blog chatter (also see Slashdot), the system may not function at full capacity until Monday, when Microsoft is expected to make an official announcement.

THE CABINET OF DR CALIGARI, the original Expressionist 1919 version starring Conrad Veidt, has been released on the Internet Archive as a free stream or download. The Grey Lodge has all the details.

A giant thank you to Mark who held up the Reblog over the past two weeks. We hear through the grapevine that even Rhizome is going to convert to the Reblog software!! Next up are artists Michelle Kempner and James Powderly of Robotclothes.com. They are currrently in-residence at Eyebeam working on a robot project; for more exciting information about them which is too numerous to mention here...check out their site. Take is away Michelle and James!

Cory Doctorow: London's Ravensbourne College is creating a new program called the School of Computing for the Creative Industries. The whole of the coursewear is Creative Commons licensed and the school itself is organized via a wiki. That's pretty twenty-first-century education!

.nsf stands for NES sound format. They are NES ROM images with all the graphics and stuff removed leaving just the music - so in each one you normally get the entire soundtrack to a game. So they're close to the best thing ever. And they're only a few kb each, so you can have unlimited beepy goodness

You need special players to play them - the one I use is a Winamp plugin called NotSo Fatso (available below)

NotSo Fatso.exe

It's not only the old games that you can listen to though - the people over at 2A03 (the name of the NES sound processor) have archived over 1000 original compositions by the likes of Nullsleep and others

You can get pretty much any game soundtrack you want through Google, but I've picked a few of my favourites. You'll be able to recognize a few of The Advantage's tracks, as well as those Saskrotch turned into amen-laced breakcore classics

Konami Kukeiha Club - Castlevania.zip
Konami Kukeiha Club - Castlevania 2.zip
H Maezawa & K Sada - Contra.zip
Rob Hubbard - The Immortal.nsf
Nobuyuki & Marumo & N Kodaka et al - Journey to Silius.zip
Ogretsu, Manami, Ietel, YuukiChan - Megaman 2.zip
Hiro 'Hip' Tanaka - Metroid.zip
Brad Fuller - Tengen Tetris.zip
Konchano - The Legend of Zelda.zip

2A03 NSF Archive.zip

My photo of LoVid is used in a brochure for upcoming events at the Kitchen; above is a scanned detail. The image originally appeared here on this blog as part of its ongoing experiment in citizen journalism and public multitasking.

Using the Google Map API, to power the site Suramya Tomar created gWiFi to make it easier for the road-warrior's, students, free loaders etc to find locations that offer free wireless internet access in the New York City area by showing all free wireless nodes on a Map of New York.

Tomar says to have created gWiFi because nothing like this already existed and it is something that a lot of people will find useful. In a request to collaborate he adds:

"The best way to help me would be to point me to a geocoder program/Create a Geocoder program that is not as picky as Geocoder.us. If thats a bit to heavy for you (As its for me) you could instead volunteer to help manually fix the address that Geocoder chokes on".

Got something to say? Scrolling belt buckle can’t reach a wide enough audience? Strap on the SMS Guerrilla Projector and take over the public with your text, you badass, you.

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The truck exploded only a couple of hours ago. But, already, the wreckage looks ancient, like a ship dredged to the surface after a century on the ocean floor. Everything inside the cab is shredded. The dashboard has been thrown loose, and singed black. The seats are atomized. The odometer sits on the ground, not far from where the driver’s door used to be.

The orange Mercedes was part of a long line of cement trucks, waiting to deliver their goods to Camp Victory when the base opened for commercial traffic at eight. Then, a pair of the trucks exploded -- a botched attempt, apparently, to detonate suicide bombs inside of the base. Two men are dead. One of the attackers has been captured.

Military investigators are still trying to piece together exactly what happened. The bombs might have been thrown into the trucks by a car passing by; the jury-rigged weapons might have already been in hand.

I try to pay attention to the conflicting theories, to the line of men waiting to be questioned. But I keep staring at the scraps of freshly-ended lives that are quickly turning into artifacts under the blazing Mesopotamian sun. The driver must have been wearing the black sandals which now lie in front of the truck. Maybe he had some pita with his breakfast; a crust now sits near the shoes. Before he died, he might have read from the crinkled, torn Koran resting a few feet away. Or he could have listened to a cassette; strands of audio tape are strewn all over the wreckage.

Back on the base, I wonder how much of this to put in public, to share with my family and my fiancée. I want to record what I see; I don’t want to worry the people I love.

It’s a dilemma soldiers here cope with every day. They crave their families’ support; they’re crippled by their concern. Most of the troops I’ve spoken to choose the keep their loved ones in the dark. “I tell ‘em all that CNN is full of shit and that nothing’s going on here,” one national guardsman says. “We don’t get shot at. We haven’t seen anyone who’s unfriendly. They think that I have a desk job, that I never go outside the wire” – Camp Victory’s concrete walls.

But letting CNN write your letters home can only fuel the worry. “Every time a bomb goes off in Baghdad, I get e-mails asking, ‘Are you alright? Are you alright?’” an officer here sighs.

Because the networks aren’t very good at conveying the subtle shades of danger in a place like this. Either they lead, big, with a new act of carnage – or they bury the news from here at the end of the broadcast. That leaves the impression that all of Iraq is in flames, all of the time. Which is just plain wrong.

Here around Camp Victory, for example, the last week has been a relatively quiet one. Iraqi army and police patrols have grown noticeably since I’ve been here. Smiles outnumber hard stares 100 to 1. And when there has been violence, it has been relatively small-scale – like the single RPG shot fired in my general direction the other night.

So I’m going to keep writing what I see, for the few days I have left here. Painting events in muted colors, instead of TV’s garish brights. And capturing my experience in Iraq, before it becomes twisted fragments on history’s road.

We've been fans of TVboy and his Concept Box Magazine for quite some time, so we were thrilled to learn that TVboy has gound a publisher for a Concept Box Book. The book, to be published by Arpabooks will be in both Italian and English and will be released in December.

So if you would like to submite your sticker logos (see above) you need to send Tvboy the image on a white background. Digital files(VECTOR OR JPGS 5x5 CM - 300DPI) should be emailed to conceptboxthebook (at) libero (dot) it

Or send stickers by mail to:

CONCEPT BOX ® THE BOOK
C/O TVBOY
C/ DE LA MARINA 92, 5è, 2a
C.P. 08018 BARCELONA
(BCN) CATALUNYA
SPAIN

The deadline is September 1, 2005

For more info, go here.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1437291,0008.htm Actors and Gangsters

*Given that these phone-tap records are five years old, this prosecution of Bollywood bad boy Salman Khan sure seems lackadaisical.

*A couple of weeks back, the contents of his phone calls were leaked to the press. Check out the extensive unsavoriness of this ungentlemanly harangue. Somebody in the Indian underworld and/or the Indian secret service has had enough lip out of Salman. http://www.salmanonline.net/ A worship-site for the lad in question Salman in all his moon-eyed pop-star glory:

What it sounds like when you wiretap tough-guy Bollywood heart-throbs talking to their estranged movie-star girlfriends:

http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1407052,0008.htm

The Salman Tapes

HT Mumbai Special Mumbai, July 14, 2005

These telephone conversations between Salman Khan and Aishwarya Rai were recorded between August 28-30, 2001. Ash was supposed to leave for a long tour of the US. Salman starts calling her on the eve of her departure.

The conversations start friendly enough, but rapidly degenerate into threats, boasts and abuse. Following are excerpts from the Salman Tapes:

Aishwarya Rai: Hello.

Salman Khan: I want you to do the Abu Salem show. Hello? SK: When I told you to do the Salem show you put the phone down. F**k you. You are doing the Salem show because of me. I asked you to the Salem show. You are not talking to me.

Ash: F**k you. SK: You f***ing bitch. Are you doing the Salem show or not? I want to know whether you are doing the Salem show or not? Ash: Oh really, you got drunk.

SK: Are you doing the Salem show or not? Abu Salem show or not? Abu Salem show or not? Ash: Your phone is tapped.

SK: You know my phone is tapped. I want to save my own ass, you f***ing b***h. I would like to know whether you are doing the show or not. Ash: Salman. SK: No, tell me, you f***ing b***h whether you are doing the Salem show or not. Ash: You're too late.

SK: You know Chori Chori Chupke Chupke? I was the only one who knew it was a Chhota Shakeel film. Ash: Listen, listen. Now stop it, Salman. SK: I will call up Salem and compromise. You don't know anything that is happening. It is a big bad world. You don't know the connectivity (sic) of the underworld.

No listen to me. Chori Chori Chupke Chupke was a Chhota Shakeel film. I was the only one who knew. Not even Nadeem Rizvi or Bharat Shah. I did this role because I was scared of Chhota Shakeel... (Shakeel said) Yeh Mussalman aadmi hamara Hindustan ko agey lekar jayega. So I did Chhota Shakeel's film and that is what I had to do.

Ab mujhe Salem Saheb ke phone aa rahe hain. Ab aap ke mere relationship hain. Jaise Dawood Bhai mere bade bhai ke relationship hain. Chhota Shakeel ka mere relationship hain. To aap ka hoga. We are hand in glove.

Ash: Hello? SK: Abi aap ne disconnect nahin kiya. Itna information ley liya phone pe. Ash: Hello?

Kyonke main underworld se taluk rakta hoon... mujhse contact nahin rakna? (They get disconnected)

SK: Phone nahin rakha. Mere liye point prove karne ke liye. Ha. Tum ne kabhi Salem se baat nahin kiya? Ash. RAW hain jo mere conversation sun reha hain. Dawood Ibrahim kuch nahin hai. Salem kuch nahin hain. Chhota Shakeel kuch nahin. Jo bhi hain woh main hoon.

Yeh muje malum hain ki Ash ka phone tapped hain. Is liye disconnect ho gaya. Muje malum hain mera phone tapped hain. Ash law abiding citizen hain. Unhone London airport mein phone guma diya. Kyonke main underworld se taluk rakta hoon. To mujse contact nahin rakna? Ash: Ho Ho.

SK: You are trying to pretend you don't have to do anything with me. Suno mere bhai suno. Salman Khan, don't you dare... Ash: Yeah? SK: You had a problem. You call me up.

Ash: I called you up because I had a problem.

SK: You never call me up otherwise. Anyway Ashji. You are going to be there for 47 days. Ok, 47 days my guys are there. They will watch what you do there like the last trip. Ash: Salman Khan, don't you dare. SK: Don't you dare f**k with me, Ash. I know Abu Salem, Chhota Shakeel, Dawood Ibrahim, Guru Satam...

SK: Underworld people call me up here. I am their main man in Bombay. I do all that s**t. Ash: Stop it. Don't talk nonsense. You can get into trouble. Ash: Ok, Christ. SK: F**k you. F**k you. Don't use that language towards me.

Ash: Stop it. SK: You use abusive language against me. I know Abu Salem, Chhota Shakeel and I know Dawood Ibrahim and Chhota Rajan. I know Guru Satam and all these underworld people. If I say ,"Aisi r***i ne mujhse aise baat ki", they will shoot you. Pehle baap ko maro m*******d, phir bhai ko maro, phir isko maro. Pehle pao pe maro, phir thigh pe maro, phir haat pe maro.

I have the power to do that. You know I can do that. It is a fact, it is a fact.